Paul captures 20 of 24 Minnesota delegates in CD conventions

posted at 9:21 am on April 24, 2012 by Ed Morrissey

It’s tough these days to be a Republican in Minnesota. While the party managed to take control of both chambers of the state legislature in 2010 for the first time in decades, the organization is deeply in debt, thanks to mismanagement under previous leadership, and seems at times in total disarray. A sex scandal in the state Senate leader’s office that forced then-majority leader Amy Koch to give up her position didn’t help either. The latest stumble has national implications, however:

Minnesota will send 40 delegates to the Republican National Convention. Twenty of the 24 delegates based on congressional districts were awarded to Texas Rep. Ron Paul in selection processes that concluded this weekend.

Thirteen Minnesota delegates will be allocated based on the results of a statewide convention in May, according to Paul campaign senior adviser Doug Wead.

Wead wrote on his blog that GOP presidential front-runner Mitt Romney is an a “panic” after the Paul landslide. Similar efforts to bolster the Texas congressman’s delegate count are underway in Iowa, Colorado, Maine and other states.

“[A] number of Romney Hawks are now deeply concerned that Ron Paul has already laid the groundwork for similar success in six more caucus states,” Wead wrote.

In Minnesota, delegates get chosen in congressional-district conventions, and they are not bound to any candidate. I ran for one of these positions in CD-02 on Saturday as part of a “unity slate” backed by GOP candidates for leadership positions in the organization. None of us even came close to winning; we later found out that the closest anyone else came to winning those slots was more than 100 votes behind the second and third place finishers, who tied. The same tie occurred when electing alternates.

So what happened? Paul supporters organized at the local level and got themselves elected as delegates to CD conventions. They then showed up to the conventions — unlike some others — and played by the rules. At our convention, there were no disruptions, no demonstrations, no attempts to hijack the proceedings. The Paul supporters just organized effectively and outboxed the party establishment. My radio partner Mitch Berg reported that the same thing happened in CD-04, but worries more about what comes next:

Some of their leadership was motivated by fairly palpable anger over the “way they were treated in 2008″, when quite a few GOP activists gamed the system to keep the first wave of Paul supporters out of power. To their political credit, they spent their four years organizing, and did a good job of it.

Less to their credit? While anger is a good motivator, “anger at the inner workings of a political party” has, I’m going to guess, a short shelf life. And at least in the Fourth CD, the anger was manifested by ballot. The twitter stream during the convention indicated that at other districts, Paul supporters booed Dan Severson and Pete Hegseth, whose main transgression was “not being Kurt Bills”, the Paul crowd’s candidate for Senate, or refusing to stand to support John Kline at the 2nd District convention when he was re-endorsed. …

While the crowd of Paul supporters at the convention Saturday carefully replaced their “Ron Paul” posters and stickers with “Kurt Bills” goodies, and voted to endorse Tony Hernandez by a 190-5-5 margin (after running a skillful campaign to win support from most of the establishment and Paul crowds), I have yet to hear a lot of support for, or even especially much awareness of, races farther down ticket or, more importantly, for candidates who get endorsed even if they’re not on the Paul slate.

Now, I know that there are a lot of good, committed people among the Paul crowd who are committed to using their positions in the GOP to work for the party, not just a candidate or two.

But I get a different impression from some of their leadership. Ronald Reagan once said that if someone agrees with you 70% of the time, it doesn’t make them 30% your enemy.

And from some of the Paul crowd’s leadership, I do get the impression that, whether motivated by single-candidate zeal or roiling anger over 2008 or one of the mind-boggling number of byzantine interpersonal pissing matches that seems to motivate so much of CD4 GOP politics no matter who the nominee or the cause celebre or what the defining issue is, the Paul crowd’s leadership, in the district and beyond, sees “70% friends” as “30% enemies”.

The Paul campaign wants to believe that they can replicate this outcome in other caucus states, and it’s certainly possible. But in Minnesota, they had an opening left by a party in serious disarray. How serious? They may soon find themselves homeless:

The Minnesota Republican Party is facing eviction for nonpayment of more than $111,000 in rent at its longtime headquarters near the Capitol.

Republican Party Chairman Pat Shortridge tried to assure party faithful on Monday that he expects the party will keep its home office, but acknowledged that the party has not paid a full month’s rent for a year.

“We’re not going to be evicted,” Shortridge said, although the eviction matter is due to be heard in Ramsey County District court next Tuesday. He added that the party is “continuing to negotiate on the back payments as well as on a lease that better fits both our space needs and our budget.”

The possible eviction is the latest blow for a state Republican Party that is swamped with debt and financial problems. The party, $2 million in arrears on bills and debt related to the 2010 gubernatorial recount, is being investigated by the Minnesota Campaign Finance and Public Disclosure Board for inaccurate campaign reporting.

This isn’t the fault of Shortridge, who just recently took the party chair position to try to right the ship. The state GOP has had to focus on rebuilding its fiscal position more than the internal and external politics of the 2012 cycle. Without that kind of focus, the party didn’t have the resources to deal with the Paul organization, and the delegate wins are one consequence. That’s actually a minor consequence compared to what will happen if the state GOP doesn’t recover in time to organize for its effort in November to hold their legislative advantages, to say nothing of the mission to replace Amy Klobuchar in the US Senate.

Even if the Paul organization managed to steal a march in the caucus states, it’s not likely to damage Mitt Romney, at least not directly. Rick Santorum was winning more of the caucus states, so the delegates will mostly come from his column, not Romney’s. The only real threat will be that Paul delegates might embarrass the party at the convention by staging some kind of organized demonstration, but Ron Paul himself would probably keep that from happening; he wants to build the organization so that his son can use it within the GOP, not to excise Rand from the GOP. And once again, the Paul supporters in the CD-02 convention didn’t aim at disruption at all — just victory for their cause.

Blowback

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I live in Southern California, rural Southern California at that, and man are the vast majority of Ronulans out here Bat$hit crazy. Of course being as this is California I guess that probably isn’t all that surprising.

SWalker on April 24, 2012 at 11:56 AM

Don’t you think that your S Cali experience with Ronulans is unique :)…I live in N Cali (big town) and the Ronulans that I know are borderline psychotic, a step away from confinement or long term medication…and by this I mean people that you cannot have a normal conversation with, they either start shouting at you when you disagree with them (yeah, how we should disband the military completely, imbecility of this kind), foaming at the mouth literally, or they go on and on and on about the legalization of pot, regardless the topic of conversation…which makes one think what the heck ‘pot’ they have in mind anyways, since the one I call ‘pot’ is semi-legal to downright legal in California…so, I inquired with one of them and he told me that his group is for the legalization of all drugs, not just pot, but ‘pot’ is a more appropriate term to use for PR reasons…

Amazing how members of the party that’s SUPPOSED to be for maximum liberty, minimal government intrusion, responsible spending, and the like are spewing so much bile at the candidates and people who are actually espousing said beliefs.

El Dillo on April 24, 2012 at 12:04 PM

Not to mention the ever-popular “You’re all crazy because we said so and we KNOW we’re right!”

When I mean win a state, I mean get a majority of the primary votes, not manipulate the caucus process.

You’re not going to win the general election with such methods. If Paul cannot win a state fair and square through an open primary where anyone who wants to can vote for him, what chance does he have in a general election?

Yep. Several vets in the family. Not a single one would even give RP a second glance.

Christien on April 24, 2012 at 12:08 PM

Yup, same here, not to mention several in-laws who are active service right now, and none of them or their friends likes Ron Paul even a little bit. Anecdotal evidence, certainly, but it has far more substance to it then the totally unverified Ronulan claims online.

Yep. Several vets in the family. Not a single one would even give RP a second glance.

Christien on April 24, 2012 at 12:08 PM

I’m a veteran of Iraq and Bosnia and I support Ron Paul. Instead of using the anecdotal (“I don’t know anyone in the military who supports Ron Paul, therefore no one in the military supports Ron Paul.”), why not use a more reliable metric like who gets the most from the military in terms of donations? Why is it so hard to believe that the military would be loathe to support Romney?

MN is a screwed up state. Remember, they voted in Franken as a Senator. That says a lot about how messed up a state they have become. Voting for Paul is just another sign that they have have almost lost their entire way.

They all listened to him state his case then politely and respectfully came to the decision he is not worth a second look. I have not heard one of them say a single disparaging remark about him. Just a simple, firm, “No, thank you.”

Ron Paul gets more money from military personnel than all the other candidates COMBINED!!
steve123 on April 24, 2012 at 12:13 PM
Just because someone checks a box on a form doesn’t mean they are actually in the military. I have never seen a Ron Paul supporter in the military.

Ron Paul gets more money from military personnel than all the other candidates COMBINED!!

steve123 on April 24, 2012 at 12:13 PM

Ron Paul has the ability to discern military dollars from other donations? How exactly do you come to your claim? Oh that’s right you made it up since Paul is a military-hating leftist. And make no mistake that any candidate for President that says he is willing to let American troops be tried by other nations for war crimes is no friend of the United States military.

They all listened to him state his case then politely and respectfully came to the decision he is not worth a second look. I have not heard one of them say a single disparaging remark about him. Just a simple, firm, “No, thank you.”

Christien on April 24, 2012 at 12:17 PM

I guess it depends on who you are talking to. I know a group of Navy rescue guys that have done some pretty funny mocking of Ron Paul. Of course, that was out in the desert far away from their commands and after a couple of cases of beer…

Ron Paul has the ability to discern military dollars from other donations? How exactly do you come to your claim? Oh that’s right you made it up since Paul is a military-hating leftist. And make no mistake that any candidate for President that says he is willing to let American troops be tried by other nations for war crimes is no friend of the United States military.

Happy Nomad on April 24, 2012 at 12:18 PM

“Summing up, Paul’s military-connected contributions for the three months more than double such contributions to all the other Republican presidential candidates—and they also exceed Obama’s.

Isn’t it annoying when the facts don’t fit your narrative? But the truth is, Paul is the only truly pro-military candidate, and the only veteran, in the running. He understands that those brave men and women signed up to defend our homes and the Constitution, not to be police officers and social workers in Central Asian dirtholes.

Our economy IS more important than Israel. Are you suggesting that it is not?

iwasbornwithit on April 24, 2012 at 12:13 PM

This is the problem with the morons that support Paul and more than a few anti-semites that throw in with Paul when it comes to the destruction of Israel.

Governing is not so clear that you can decide to throw the Jews to their enemies and concentrate on the economy (or whatever issue). This kind of simplistic thinking plays well with the brain-dead potheads who support Ron Paul but it works no better in the real world than Christina Romer’s application of academic economic theory to the real economy. The economy is important but so too is geo-stability in the Middle East. So too is foreign affairs and national security both of which requires the kind of engagement the very stupid Ron Paul dismisses as government excess.

How much of an economy do you think we would have if the Western capitalist structure is destroyed the way Paul and his worthless supporters advocate as a good idea?

It’s all good. I guess my point is that, when it was all said and done, they all came to the same sober, reasoned conclusion, sans ridicule or vitriol or disrespect, that RP is not worth their vote. I agree with them.

wow, there are a whole lot of butt hurt fiscal moderates in this thread. Pro Constitution libertarians are taking the party back, that’s a good thing.

rndmusrnm on April 24, 2012 at 12:21 PM

It’s worse than that. A lot of the “conservatives” that don’t like Ron Paul are older people living off the govt. teat in some form such as Medicare, Medicaid or Social Security. They are afraid that Ron Paul will actually back up his rhetoric about cutting the size and scope of government as opposed to Romney who they know will actually do nothing and continue their gravy train. Oh but they will talk a good game about how the government is too big (just don’t touch THEIR goodies).

JohnGalt23 on April 24, 2012 at 11:03 AM
DevilsPrinciple on April 24, 2012 at 11:06 AM
How about the term hyperbole, ever heard of it?

Yes, I have heard or read the term, many times from you and your ilk, and evidently you’ve mastered it well. Calling others crazy based on anecdote is one way of reflecting YOUR character, or lack therof, to the rest of those YOU encounter. The rest of your statement reduces you to that of an uneducated fool. And, thank you for revealing your true self.

I honestly haven’t met one Paul supporter where I live. Haven’t seen a bumper sticker for him. Haven’t seen any bumper stickers for anyone except old Obama and Bush stickers. I saw some Paul stuff in 2008. Haven’t seen any this year, though.

He just isn’t a viable candidate, thankfully. A Paul Presidency would be just one joke after another.

You mean like the straw polls taken in the caucus states? You’re right, those don’t matter; what matters is delegates to the national convention. And here we are, talking about how Paul is poised to gain large numbers of delegates to the National Convention. So Paul is, in fact, doing well where it counts.

Not in the Republican primary, but that’s only because when Ron Paul was about to surge, that very day Rush Limbaugh broke the 11th commandment and unfairly smeared Ron Paul for far less than Rush has defended Newt for in the past. At my county caucus there was a guy who told me he would have supported Ron Paul if not for something Rush said, he couldn’t remember what it was specifically.

In spite of unfair treatment from the right, especially the big-gov establishment, Ron Paul still fares about as good as Romney in head to heads, even better sometimes.

If Ron Paul get’s a surge before it’s too late, his numbers will climb and he could go all the way. Unlike Romney, who can never hope to beat Obama by much more than 50/50, Ron Paul actually has a broad base of support and with some help from the right instead of hindrance, he can beat Obama in a landslide.

I believe Ron Paul’s claim that he gets more donations from active duty military than all the other GOP candidates combined has been independently verified. And of all the GOP candidates, he’s the only one that has served in the military.

FloatingRock on April 24, 2012 at 11:41 AM

False. (Well, Paul did actually serve, whereas none of the others did, but do you believe that’s a pre-condition of employment in this case? I don’t.)

Ron Paul’s campaign has INSTRUCTED people to list their employer as the military. It has never been independently verified that those people are actually IN the military.

Obama’s lawyer verified Obama has no involvement in the Secret Service scandal.

How much of an economy do you think we would have if the Western capitalist structure is destroyed the way Paul and his worthless supporters advocate as a good idea?

Happy Nomad on April 24, 2012 at 12:26 PM

Wait…what?!? Who’s talking about “destroying the Western capitalist structure?” We’re talking about RESTORING it. What we have now is certainly not an economy Smith, Hayek, or Friedman would’ve endorsed. Holy crap.

Again…$17 trillion in the hole, but DON’T YOU DARE let the fiscal cons get a crack…they’ll ruin us all!!!

How are actual republican party members voting for who they want, shoving an unpopular candidate down their throats?

By definition the winner of a popular vote is the popular candidate.

Manipulating a caucus to promote a candidate who would certainly lose a popular vote, is shoving an unwanted candidate down their throats.

Rebar on April 24, 2012 at 11:34 AM

Well, you are right on the point that a direct vote would prevent the shoving of a particular candidate down anyone’s throat. Yes, you would get the candidate that the primary voters voted for.

However, direct election like that will not happen as long as the parties are in charge of the process.

Why do you think the process is so complicated now? It was designed for exactly the thing Ron Paul is using it for now, so that the party insiders could game the system to alter the raw primary vote. Take a look at the origin of these types of systems and you will see it comes from the days of the late 1800s when the “party machines” were becoming the way of politics (and they are still with us, sadly). The system is complex and multi-tiered with nominations of delegates to elect delegates that have little to do with the actual primary/caucus votes. That way, the party insiders who knew the system could game the system if the hum-drum rubes of the voting populace chose someone that wasn’t party of the “party machine”.

Ron Paul’s folks, to their credit, spent the time to learn the system, prepare the organization, and then work the very rules of the system against itself and the party it was designed to protect.

Did he game the system with it’s own rules? He absolutely did. Perhaps he should be thanked for exposing the state delegate process for the sham that it is. Maybe that was part of his goal of staying in the election for this long?

Either way, I am betting that you will see state delegate rules getting changed in a real hurry after this election, and not for the benefit of more openess in the process to us voters like you want.

Mark, I am having a hard time understanding where you get your data. I am currently stationed at Marine Corps Base Hawaii, Kaneohe Bay and have not seen a single Mitt Romney bumper sticker. However, I see Ron Paul bumber stickers driving around base almost every day. Where are these anti-troop Ron Paul supporters? Where are their comments? If being anti-war is anti-troops than I must hate myself. I’m unsure of where this logic arises from. I think it’s awesome that Ron Paul gets a lot of support from the troops but it’s really irrelevant. What is relevant is the fact that Paul stands up for the troops and their families by speaking out against these immoral wars of aggression that send more of us home in body bags. Just seeing how angry most of the rabid anti-Paul, anti-small government people are when they hear Paul gets the most support of the troops is pretty funny.

RightXBrigade on April 24, 2012 at 11:58 AM

How often do you read here?

I’m not going on a search to track them all down, but I’m telling you, There are many a post here on this website, where a supposed Paul champion will bash the troops as “warmongers and baby killers”

I have been called that on multiple occasions here by your brethren in the Paul fan base. Many other vets here will confirm that. When challenged on it, all we get is, “you just love war, and killing brown people”

and that is a direct quote from one of them..

I’ve been out a long time, but I talk to vets, I also have friends, online, and offline who have served multiple tours in Iraq and Afghanistan.. so don’t condescend to me.. We simply do not see this supposed mass support.. and I doubt you do either.. Most troops are nonplolitical, they have their own principles, but rarely pay anything close to the amount of attention to it, that we do, being political junkies..

I don’t doubt you see a few Paul stickers..

but seriously?

You have to be blind deaf and dumb not to see what some of Paul’s base are saying about you… and don’t p[lay that anti-war isn’;t anti-troop stuff with me.. no Soldier Sailor, Marine or Airman is pro-war.. that’s insane.. The night we sent men into Afghanistan, the 82nd air drop, I felt sick for days, nobody here loves war.. that’s bullshit to even suggest it.. but Paul fans do.

What’s even more bullshit, is claimimng Paul gets way more support from the troops.. when the fact is.. the troops largely don’t display support for ANY candidate.. The UCMJ remember?.. no overt displays of political activity are tolerated..

Most all troops take that seriously.. the tiny contingent of the Paul voters..

Of course I didn’t say Israel or the middle east or foreign affairs are unimportant issues, but you knew that. I said that our economy is more important. Do you disagree? Do you think that the US economy should take a backseat to supporting Israel? THAT is crazy.

You think Ron Paul is trying to destroy the “Western capitalist structure”? OOoookaaay. Please provide an example of this.

False. (Well, Paul did actually serve, whereas none of the others did, but do you believe that’s a pre-condition of employment in this case? I don’t.)

Washington Nearsider on April 24, 2012 at 12:30 PM

No, I don’t think Ron Paul should be the nominee just because he is the only candidate to have served in the military, having been drafted around the time of the Cuban Missile Crisis, (which Dana Perino embarrassed herself about), but it is something. Certainly serving in the military is a lot better than strapping a dog to the roof of the car on a two day road trip, isn’t it?

What’s even more bullshit, is claimimng Paul gets way more support from the troops.. when the fact is.. the troops largely don’t display support for ANY candidate.. The UCMJ remember?.. no overt displays of political activity are tolerated..

Most all troops take that seriously.. the tiny contingent of the Paul voters..

not so much.

mark81150 on April 24, 2012 at 12:31 PM

my spouse is in the military and sure they can’t do politics overtly…but they can donate to campaigns, my spouse donates to the Romney campaign regularly and they do ask for your occupation and employer when you do it online, don’t know about the rest, since we donate only online…so, they can gather statistics about the military support for X or Y candidate from the donation forms…

Well then, educate me. I’d love to see evidence that the GOP leadership has any real interest in eliminating the debt and returning to something even in the same area code as fiscal sanity. I really would.

Here in Minnesota, we handed the GOP their first bicameral leadership in a LOOOOOOOONG time based on their pledges to CUT THE BUDGET. So naturally, the budget increased by $2-$5 billion, depending on who you ask.

You want to know why conservatives are getting fed up with the Republican Party? There you have it.

Who’s talking about “destroying the Western capitalist structure?” We’re talking about RESTORING it. What we have now is certainly not an economy Smith, Hayek, or Friedman would’ve endorsed. Holy crap.

Again…$17 trillion in the hole, but DON’T YOU DARE let the fiscal cons get a crack…they’ll ruin us all!!!

#slammingheadintodesk

El Dillo on April 24, 2012 at 12:30 PM

No need to be frustrated. Just think about this: one way or the other, Paul’s domestic and foreign policy preferences are going to come into force. He’d prefer to wind up our domestic welfare boondoggles, centrally-planned economy, and foreign military entanglements in a gradual and orderly way, but even if we change nothing, all those will end. Granted, they’ll end in a disorderly, discontinuous systemic failure as the US finds itself unable to finance the military and the welfare state and the Fed destroys the dollar by monetizing the resulting shortfalls, but in any case they will have come to an end.

Obviously a gradual change is preferable, since, as Burke warned us, rapid changes tend to destroy societies, but nevertheless these changes are inevitable.

wow, there are a whole lot of butt hurt fiscal moderates in this thread. Pro Constitution libertarians are taking the party back, that’s a good thing.

rndmusrnm on April 24, 2012 at 12:21 PM

It’s worse than that. A lot of the “conservatives” that don’t like Ron Paul are older people living off the govt. teat in some form such as Medicare, Medicaid or Social Security. They are afraid that Ron Paul will actually back up his rhetoric about cutting the size and scope of government as opposed to Romney who they know will actually do nothing and continue their gravy train. Oh but they will talk a good game about how the government is too big (just don’t touch THEIR goodies).

iwasbornwithit on April 24, 2012 at 12:27 PM

Actually, libertarianism scares a lot of people who actually know what it espouses. Liberatarianism at its core is the right side of anarchism. No thanks.

With Paul being its standard bearer, it means that there are a lot of people who want nothing to do with him and his fences around the US and legalizing drugs. It has nothing to do with Medicare, Medicaid or Social Security. It is the fringe agenda that we don’t want. No thanks.

Santorum won Colorado, but many of the TEA party supported Ron Paul, and many of them ran and became delegates. If you happened to catch Glenn Beck’s interview with Freedom Works yesterday about what happened on the Utah convention floor on Tuesday, you won’t believe the media when they say that the TEA party is dead.

I have a feeling the Republican convention will not be united at the beginning, and Romney will have to earn and pay a price for the conservative vote he desperately needs to beat Obama. If the Party is going to force conservatives to vote for a moderate/liberal, then conservatives should have a say in the Party platform and convention.

For folks all about “liberty”, you sure do act all totalitarian when it comes to your cult leader.

Rebar on April 24, 2012 at 12:36 PM

Playing by the long-established party rules is “totalitarian”? Change the rules next time, if you like (and have the support for it), and we’ll play by those, as well. But don’t be a sore loser about it – it’s unbecoming of you.

Just like the N.C. situation reflects poorly on the Democrats, so will this on Republicans. It’s hard to preach fiscal responsibility from eviction.

Cindy Munford on April 24, 2012 at 12:37 PM

For that matter, it’s hard to preach fiscal responsibility when your party wouldn’t know it if it flew up behind them and bit them on the a$$. Which makes the arrogant NeoCon foot-stomping all that more d@mning.

This only counts self-identified military donations of over $200. The statement may be true as far as it goes but it hardly suggests the overwhelming mandate from the military that you claim. What military person would want a CINC willing to have them tried for war crimes by a foreign government? Ron Paul is a military-hating traitor for even suggesting this as good policy. That isn’t supporting the military in the least.

Secondly, being a veteran is not, nor has it ever been, a requirement for the Presidency. Five years as an Air Force doctor is hardly the same thing as the military experience of Eisenhower or even GHWB. I think you overstate the importance of Paul’s military service. Honorable but hardly remarkable enough to make the claim he is the only one that understands the military. At least you should acknowledge that as Governor, Romney had to deal with his state’s National Guard which is more akin to CINCUS than being a baby doc in some backwater Air Force hospital.

Finally, advocating that American troops be limited to garrisoning in this nation without any sort of international engagement is just looney for several reasons not the least of which is that there is no point for having a military if it led by a whack job appeaser who is unwilling to engage in our global society.

Here in Minnesota, we handed the GOP their first bicameral leadership in a LOOOOOOOONG time based on their pledges to CUT THE BUDGET. So naturally, the budget increased by $2-$5 billion, depending on who you ask.

You want to know why conservatives are getting fed up with the Republican Party? There you have it.

El Dillo on April 24, 2012 at 12:37 PM

Only $2.5B. Our Dem governor was given a $4B surplus when she took office due to the work of the GOP in the legislature. At the end of her 4 years, we were $6B in debt.

You got it lucky. When I read stuff like this, I just laugh. You guys need to have our governor. Luckily. she is going to be replaced this fall. Right now, the GOP candidate is leading the DEM’s candidate.

“Anti-Israel” = putting Israel behind the priority of a nearly-imploding US economy.

As an American, I can’t support that.

MelonCollie on April 24, 2012 at 12:35 PM

nonsense…what exactly does Israel do with the money the US give them? Oh, yeah, they buy US military equipment and such, does this by any chance help the US economy and keep people employed here?…oh, I forgot your logic works only in a vacuum…

You are right, those newsletters spelled out his views on this. Paul isn’t anti-Israel he just hates Jews. I’m sure once the Palestinians drove all the Jews into the sea that Paul would be first in line to support Israel.

What is it that we “give” to Israel? You mean the money that mostly comes back to generate US jobs? Or the money that ensures Israel doesn’t compete with us in arms sales? They sell arms, make no mistake about it, but can sell much, much more. They lost hundreds of millions in penalties on a Chinese sale a few years ago when we asked them to terminate the contract, did we compensate them for that loss?

Israel gets what, roughly $2B a year (that mostly comes back to us on the spot, so its a wash). How much do we spend on those military bases in Japan and Germany, per year? About $5B each? So, having Israel do the job in Middle East saves us roughly $3B per year (from not needing another base there). Easy arithmetic. That is if the money we “give” to Israel would actually stay there.

Can you name another recipient of our foreign aid monies that generates/keeps US jobs?

With Paul being its standard bearer, it means that there are a lot of people who want nothing to do with him and his fences around the US and legalizing drugs. It has nothing to do with Medicare, Medicaid or Social Security. It is the fringe agenda that we don’t want. No thanks.

Voter from WA State on April 24, 2012 at 12:38 PM

The only “fringe agenda” item you could seem to come up with is “legalizing drugs” which is NOT what Ron Paul supports. He says that it is not the business of the FEDERAL government to dictate to the states what drugs are illegal but that he believes that the states can decide for themselves whether or not to decriminalize drugs. Why do you think that decision is better made at the national level than the state level?

Actually, libertarianism scares a lot of people who actually know what it espouses. Liberatarianism at its core is the right side of anarchism. No thanks.

Voter from WA State on April 24, 2012 at 12:38 PM

Yes, we know: it scares the daylights out of tyrants who want to use the force of government to meddle in peoples personal lives, break down doors and arrest them, or to force them to buy products from their corporate cronies and so forth. Also, there are a lot of people at the top who benefit from inflationary monetary policy that don’t want the gravy train to end. There are all sort of reasons that big-gov people hate libertarians. But while Ron Paul is more of a libertarian-conservative, being pro life and conservative in his own beliefs. Ron Paul is pre-boomer, he grew up before the hippy movement.

Finally, advocating that American troops be limited to garrisoning in this nation without any sort of international engagement is just looney for several reasons not the least of which is that there is no point for having a military if it led by a whack job appeaser who is unwilling to engage in our global society.

Happy Nomad on April 24, 2012 at 12:40 PM

“Engaging in global society” =/= nation-building or indefinite presence in third world hellholes were a pleasant Sunday is defined as picking off US troops.

The premise is simple: eff with us, and you die. No rebuilding, no ten- or fifty-year presence, nothing. You kill one of us, we end your country with malice. Absent that, protect the homeland first and foremost.